Ionic Liquid Based Dispersive Liquid–Liquid Microextraction for Preconcentration of Zearalenone and Its Determination in Beer and Cereal Samples by High-Performance Liquid Chromatography with Fluorescence Detection

Abstract

A simple, fast, and efficient ionic liquid based dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction has been developed for the determination of trace amounts of zearalenone for the first time. Preconcentrated zearalenone was determined by high performance liquid chromatography with fluorescence detector. Two ionic liquids, 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl) imide and 1-methyl-3-octylimidazolium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl) imide were used as extraction solvents. Several analytical parameters affecting the extraction efficiency such as sample pH, type, and volume of dispersive solvent, volume of ionic liquid, time of extraction, and centrifugation were optimized. The 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl) imide showed the better extraction efficiency. Thus, the method validation and the application of the method to real samples were carried out with 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl) imide. Under the optimum conditions, the calibration curve for zearalenone determination was linear in the range of 1–750 µg L−1(R2 = 0.9960) and the limit of detection was 0.25 µg L−1 for zearalenone. The inter-day and intra-day precisions of the developed method were in the range of 1.36–3.02%. The method was successfully applied to beer and cereal (wheat and corn) samples. The recovery percentages of zearalenone for spiked samples were between were 80.0 and 100.0%.